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Sunday, October 16, 2016

Florida: Marvelous for Murder – A Guest Post by Lesley A. Diehl

This month, Fabulous Florida Writers is pleased to welcome guest blogger Lesley Diehl. Diehl is the author of cozy mysteries featuring sassy country girls who enjoy snooping. Her latest release is Mud Bog Murder, book 4 of the Eve Appel Mysteries, a series set in rural Florida. Diehl was our featured writer on January 6, 2014.

I’ve set some of my mysteries in other locations, but my
favorite place for leaving a body and solving the crime is Florida. I have two
series set in rural Florida, and I live among the swamps, canals, cowboys,
cattle, horses, turtles, feral pigs and alligators much of the year. Because my
home is inland and not on one of Florida’s coasts, I find myself with a
different picture of the state and why it is especially suited to bumping off
people. I also admit that the Florida most know works well for a mystery
setting, just for different reasons. I find Florida writers use Florida in ways
writers in other states do not. For my work, as for that of my fellow Florida
writers, I find setting inextricably intertwined with plot and character.
Here’s how that works:

1.Lull the reader into the beauty of the beaches and then
kill someone

It’s a great place to use the beautiful beaches, waving palm
trees, and blue waters in juxtaposition to grisly death. Similarly, a writer
can take the reader for a fun ride or adventure in Disney’s paradise and plant
a dead body there, perhaps in a teacup ride. There is something so startling
about killers in paradise. And something so satisfying about a sleuth who
ignores the beauty to take on the case and find the bad guys (and gals). What
dedication. We tourists love this sleuth for his or her determination and
intelligence. Writers such as Randy Wayne White and James W. Hall create
protagonists who are eager to rescue us from the clutches of those who think
they are above the law. Along with these crime fighters, we can work up a real
mad to think that anyone could ruin the serenity of coastal existence.

2.Underneath all that beauty lurks ugliness

The state may have been more bug infested and swampy before
the developers got here, but paradise comes at a cost. Carl Hiaasen uses
rampant destruction of wildlife and habitat to create scenarios that in any other
state would be viewed as sheer fantasy. Here, they can happen. Likewise, in Mud Bog Murder, I write about how mud
bogging alters the ecosystem. It provides a perfect opportunity to make
fictional work relevant to contemporary social, economic and environmental
issues.

3.Beauty and greed make for interesting characters

Take paradise and couple it with overzealous money grubbing
and you’ve got the perfect recipe for villains, some so evil we can hardly wait
until they get their comeuppance and others so crazy we want them to return to
wreak havoc again. Hiaasen gives the latter type of villain free rein in his
books, while Tim Dorsey creates characters so unusual that we aren’t sure if
they are protagonists or bad guys, but we tolerate their criminal doings book
after book. It’s hard to imagine any of the characters in Hiaasen’s and Dorsey’s
books living in Vermont or Iowa. Nope. But take beach erosion and a developer
eager to accommodate a hotel owner’s need to keep the beach lovely for guests
and you’ve got part of the plot for Hiaasen’s newest book especially when the
sand comes from Cuba!

4.There are other places in Florida to hide bodies—better
places

Most Florida writers stick to the two coasts and the Florida
Keys, and why not? They are lovely places to live and locations familiar to
both the residents of Florida, most of whom reside in these places, and the
tourists who choose to visit where there is ocean. With the exception of
Orlando, home of that famous mouse and his pals, truly a world away from the
usual, most areas of Florida inland are rarely visited by tourists and rarely
written about by Florida writers. A few of us think the swamps and grazing
lands of Florida make perfect places for killing someone and then hiding the
body. Because of the large number of alligators, a discarded body can stay hidden
forever. You do the math. There’s no juxtaposition of environmental beauty with
murder here, only denizens of the swamp waiting for their dinner. This swampy
reality is of real benefit to writers like Deborah Sharp whose Mace Bauer
series is set in rural Florida and features a protagonist who has grown up in
the area, works as an environmental officer and uses an alligator’s head as a
coffee table decoration. The latter is an indication of beauty in the eye of
the beholder, and readers of the Mace Bauer series will see a lot of this point
of view in the characters and the plots of the books.

I allow my characters to embrace rural Florida, although my
protagonist is a Yankee who has moved to Florida and adopted the rural setting
as her new home. I have taken Eve Appel from a gal who finds the swamps,
grasslands, cattle and cowboys alien and somewhat frightening to someone who
embraces the unique nature of the place and becomes part of the community, not
without difficulty, of course. Learning to live with alligators on the fairways,
in the backyard, under the car or on the menu in a restaurant is not
accomplished without some strain, and being accepted into a community whose
values sometimes run counter to her own has created some bumps along the way
for Eve. She’s a spunky gal who’s up to the challenge.

Florida is the perfect place to set a mystery regardless of
what part of the state a writer uses as the book’s locale. For more information
about the uniqueness of Florida, pick up any local newspaper and read about
water pollution, runaway development, dirty politicos and dirty cops—oops, you
can find those in any state, sorry; we just do them so much more colorfully
here—destruction of habitat, invasion of non-indigenous species other than
tourists, and sinkholes. Speaking of sinkholes, I used a large one to hide a
still in a book, but I should really consider using one as a place to toss a
body. There is no end to what Florida will encourage a writer to conjure up to
keep the reader entangled in the story.

Oh, and did I say I write cozy mysteries? Humorous cozy
mysteries? Somehow that seems fitting in a state where running into a land
developer on the sidewalk may prove as dangerous as an alligator in your pool.

4 comments:

Great blog, Lesley. Of course, I think Texas is a great place for a murder also. It's really big. But sometimes, you can see for miles and hiding a body might be difficult. Not where I live, though. I live in the middle of a forest. Nearest neighbor is a mile away. So, a body ... perhaps Id better stop right here. Enjoyed the blog.

A fascinating analysis of why Florida is a great setting for murder mysteries. I've always thought so, but I do use the west coast, Naples to be exact, as my setting. Interesting to read about the setting possibilities elsewhere in the state.

JACQUELINE

Based on a true story, "Jacqueline" is a tale of family, faith, unusual friendships, and the resiliency of the human spirit set against the backdrop of occupied Rennes in 1944. With the drama of fiction and the authenticity of personal history, "Jacqueline" is both a story about family and a family's story.

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About Me

I'm currently a columnist for The Island Reporter, a publication serving the South Gulf Beaches in St. Petersburg, Florida. My Florida Authors series features articles based on exclusive interviews with some of the state’s best writers. My “Pride & Joy” column
profiles individuals who give back to their communities through volunteerism.
I'm also the author of two novels."Project June Bug" is the story of a young teacher’s efforts to help a student with ADHD. It has received 12 awards, including Premier Book Awards “2009 Book of the Year.” My latest novel, "Jacqueline,"(published by Anaiah Press) is a middle grade historical based on an experience my dad, a WWII veteran, had while stationed in France shortly after D-day. Four of my stories have appeared in "Chicken Soup for the Soul" editions.
I live on Treasure Island (yes, it's as beautiful as it sounds), with my husband and two rather noisy macaws. In my spare time, I enjoy reading, walking on the beach, and visiting family in New Jersey, where I'm the proud "Grammy" of six beautiful grandchildren (with the pictures to prove it!)